Abortion Storm Clouds

Historians shudder a lot these days. But nothing has made me more nervous than this: Life-or-death moral imperatives are being tied to states and regions. We’ve seen this before and it led to the most horrific war in American history.

We’ve been divided along moral and geographic lines before…

We don’t want to be hyperbolic or hysterical. The historical precedent, though, is clear and alarming. In the years before the 1860 presidential election, major parties like the Democrats and Whigs tended to have support in both North and South. In that crucial contest, though, the regions divided cleanly and ominously.

At the same time, as Bill Scher has pointed out, sixteen other states already have laws on the books that ban abortion. If SCOTUS were to overturn Roe v. Wade, those states would become “Life States,” while places like New York and California would become “Rainbow” or “Freedom” states.

2 Comments

I liked Roe v. Wade, because it recognizes that the woman is a moral agent who should be trusted to make her own moral choices. However …

I also thought, at the time, that it was a bad court decision. The question of abortion needed to be worked out at the grass roots of politics. And that supreme court decision aborted the grass roots processes that were underway. Compare that to Obergefell vs. Hodges (same sex marriage), which was pretty much settled at the grass roots level before the court reached its conclusion.